I know that to some even talking about energy conservation makes you a socialist but I happen to believe that energy efficiency is something to strive for regardless of the validity of global warming.

Currently our electricity meters are on the outside of the house where few home owners ever see them. They were put there so that meter readers could see them. But this is the 21st century. My gas consumption is feed wirelessly to a vehicle that drives by. Even that is inefficient. My readings should be sent via the web to the utility (people shouldn't have to come by my house to get the info).

But anyway, that isn't the point of this posting. I know that I, personally, would use much less electricity if I could readily see my current usage (and even the translated cost). If I turned off a light and the reading went down I would turn out more lights. How hard would it be to run a wire from the meter to a small LED readout say in the kitchen? If everyone has this I'm willing to bet that electricity usage would drop by 30%.

Seeing how much you are using or spending has a direct impact. I also think that applies to health care too but that is for another discussion...

I like your idea too. You can take it really far. Did you know you can send data through existing power cables in your house? What if all your appliances could broadcast statistics on their consumption to your computer. Software could compile it into charts and graphs so that you could give meaningful instructions to your house.

Or maybe its just too much trouble for the average shlub, so you could start with defaults and let the user customize as they wish. There are endless possibilities really. We don't have to cut growth or population or sell our souls to socialist slavery. Whatever we do, it shouldn't curtail our freedom. We must always enhance it.

Did you know you can send data through existing power cables in your house? What if all your appliances could broadcast statistics on their consumption to your computer. Software could compile it into charts and graphs so that you could give meaningful instructions to your house.

I did know that some companies were exploring internet through power lines but I guess it couldn't compete with cable and phone. Still you don't need high bandwidth for what you described so it could work just fine.

You could program your appliances to come on once the power rate reaches a specified low point.

I just can't believe it is 2010 and we can't do this. If these services were run by private companies and we had true competition I can assure you all of what we described would have been in place decades ago. Government largess at work (actually not at work).

Quote:

We don't have to cut growth or population or sell our souls to socialist slavery. Whatever we do, it shouldn't curtail our freedom. We must always enhance it.

Yep - if it was REALLY about saving the planet these types of things would be a priority (not to mention making China and India comply) but AGW is really about wealth transfer from the rich to the poor so the types of things we have described, though more effective than any regulation proposed, are of zero interest to leftists.

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot vote in polls in this forumYou can attach files in this forumYou can download files in this forum